Is waking up in the morning basically torture to you? Do you find yourself drifting off and longing for your soft bed, the outsides, or those delicious pizza leftovers during a meeting?

Don’t beat yourself up, this is actually a pretty common occurrence nowadays. Fortunately, there are a few simple and very effective morning routine habits that will improve your creativity, productivity, and overall mood.

Eat a generous and healthy breakfast

No doubt about it, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. It provides physical and mental energy to power you through the day. You will be able to better focus on your tasks and to be more efficient overall.

Although there are no restrictions when it comes to what you should eat in the morning no matter your shape or size, since you will use most of those calories during the day, if you want to get the best out of this meal you should look for high nutrients, vitamins, and minerals contents.

Exercise

I’m sure you already know exercising has many benefits for our general health and wellbeing, but did you know the best time to exercise is in the morning? A few minutes of intense physical activity will not only properly wake you up, but also oxygenate your brain. You will be able to focus properly, come up with solutions quicker and generally feel better about yourself.

If you’re like me and you feel like exercising is pointless since it involves no challenges, you can bike your way to work or ask someone to exercise with you, since this might bring out your competitive side.

Resolve your personal issues before work

Having distractions at work is practically unavoidable, whether we’re talking about a conversation taking place in your office or a pigeon flying into your window. Getting back to a task you were distracted from takes precious time and letting a few good ideas slip is unavoidable.

This is why it’s important to minimize your distractions ever since the beginning of the day. Calling your loved ones, contacting your ISP regarding your internet speed are things that should take no more than 10 minutes, so why do something later when you can do it now?

Meditate

Just like physical activity will get you in shape, meditation will sharpen your mind and give you a positive attitude towards goals, issues and people. This will lead to an advanced state of well-being and better professional and personal achievements. This will come in handy not just when you’re getting ready for work, but also when you’re preparing for a job interview. Regardless of the type of job you’re aiming for, those stressful nerves will inevitably set in before the big day. Take 15 minutes in the morning to reconnect with yourself and things should go much smoother after that.

Set your goals for the day

Regardless of what you have planned for the day, being organized is a key factor in productivity. Making a written or mental list of your activities and goals for the day will let you know how much time you have to invest in each one without leaving anything out. This can also help you prioritize them and decide how to work smart instead of hard.

Mornings are the best time do to that since you can revise your schedule with fresh eyes and maybe even improve it in ways you wouldn’t have thought about later in the day because of the pressure.

Stay away from TVs, PCs or laptops as much as possible

If you will be stuck to a chair in front of a monitor for 8 hours a day, it’s important to give your eyes and brain a little time off. You can watch the sunrise as you eat your breakfast or replace the music with the chirping of birds outside.

Even though it might be hard at first to make time for these activities, once you get used to doing them you will clearly see the improvement. Apart from concentration and productivity, these will result in a better attitude towards your life and your career.

If this is not the case, however, it might mean the career you chose is not for you and you should look into other paths you can follow. This might seem scary at first, but sooner or later you will need to get out of your comfort zone and take these positive steps towards a productive life.